In the Cambridge Hotel and Conference Centre on Sept. 26, located in Cambridge, Ont. on the outskirts of the Kitchener-Waterloo region where BlackBerry was born, the iPhone maker invited local talent with the aim of luring them to their Silicon Valley operations.

“Most positions will be based in Cupertino, CA.,” according to a LinkedIn invite sent to certain BlackBerry employees and obtained by the Financial Post. “Relocation and immigration assistance will be provided for candidates that are hired, as needed.”

Six days earlier, BlackBerry had shown it was teetering on the edge of disaster. On Sept. 20, the smartphone maker said it expected to post a nearly US$1-billion loss and would cut 4,500 jobs from their ranks worldwide (in addition to ongoing layoff rounds that had already been underway).

Photo illustration by Steven Murray/ National Post

Apple wasn’t the only one positioning themselves to pick up the pieces. Two days later, on Sept. 28 and 29, Intel Corporation held an “information session” at the Holiday Inn Kitchener-Waterloo Hotel & Conference Centre in Kitchener, Ont., as part of their search for engineers to join its Mobile and Communications Group, according to an email invite also received by BlackBerry employees.

“We would like to invite you to ‘look inside’ Intel and meet some of our amazing employees and potentially interview for an opportunity to join our team,” it read.

Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment on the recruitment drive. But an Intel spokesperson said: “We hold recruiting sessions around the world and are always looking for good people. Based in the technology triangle, this recruitment session was designed to engage with engineers.”

Apple and Intel are the latest in a growing queue of international technology giants zeroing in on the Kitchener-Waterloo region as a recruiting hotbed in the wake of BlackBerry’s decline.

Last month, Twitter Inc. co-founder Jack Dorsey arrived in Waterloo to announce that Square Inc., the San Francisco-based mobile payments company he helped co-found, would be establishing an engineering office in Waterloo to tap into the region’s local talent.

Meanwhile, on Monday, BlackBerry handed out more layoff notices and confirmed 300 employees would be laid off at its Waterloo, Ont. headquarters this week as part of the staff reductions.

The company has said it is planning to reduce the company’s total head count to 7,000 full-time employees worldwide. BlackBerry had 12,700 employees as of the end of March, the last time it has reported the size of its workforce.

BlackBerry’s future overall is in flux as well.

After several years of declining sales and shrinking profits, last month BlackBerry agreed to a tentative deal that would see the company sold to Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. — its largest single shareholder — and a consortium of investors in a deal worth US$4.7-billion, or $9 per share. Shares rose slightly on Wednesday on the Nasdaq, to close at $8.11.

While the other investors in Fairfax’s consortium remain anonymous, several major pension funds and private equity groups, including the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, are mulling a stake in the company.

The letter of intent BlackBerry has signed with Fairfax does not preclude the company from seeking out a better offer before the Nov. 4 deadline. Over the past several weeks, a number of companies — including Google, Cisco and SAP — have been rumoured to be potentially interested in acquiring all, or part, of BlackBerry.

One Canadian pension fund, Alberta Investment Management Corp., believes the company will probably be broken up into pieces. Its chief executive Leo de Bever told Bloomberg this week there were discussions among investors about valuing particular BlackBerry units, and a split of the company may be in the cards.

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